WhatsApp adds end-to-end encryption to its Android app

WhatsApp just got a whole lot more secure for Android users. On Tuesday, secure messaging company Open WhisperSystems announced that it has helped add a strong encryption protocol to the WhatsApp Android app, which means that WhatsApp (or its parent company, Facebook) can no longer read your messages in transit.

Even better, for supported devices, encryption is on by default. While there are apps with similar levels of security, WhatsApp, by many measures the most popular messaging platform in the world, is by far the largest messaging system to adopt strong end-to-end encryption.

WhatsApp is using the TextSecure protocol, which is developed by Open WhisperSystems and is also used in its own standalone app, TextSecure (currently transitioning to the Signal brand, which it is already using in its iOS incarnation.) The idea behind end-to-end encryption is that WhatsApp won’t be able to decrypt messages sent on its network, even if requested by police…